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Did Mattel sell us previously returned figures?

On Black Friday I bought 5 Skeletor figures and one He-Man figure. My package just arrived and I opened all 6 mailers. What I saw were five Skeletors with terrible paint jobs on the faces, and a He-Man with a hair piece glued on wrong so it looks like he has a huge forehead and a receeding hairline!

I'm wondering if this this simply a quality control issue, or if at least part of their inventory consisted of figures that had been previously shipped back to Mattel for a refund. What do you think?

I'd be interested to know if anyone else shares my suspicion and/or has found these or other issues with the Black Friday figures.

On a side note, I noticed the Skeletor figures had small clear bands around their neck, and you can't see them unless you pop off the heads. He-Man had no rubber band around his neck. Also, the foot joints on all of the bad Skeletor figures were just as loose as the Skeletor figure I originally purchased when the line was first released.

My first re-issue skeletor had the band around his neck peg. I've called them about a returned shipment before and they advised they destroy all returned items because they don't know what's happened once they've left the warehouse. But the SDCC skeletor I purchased has the open hand with the original burst on his packaging, and he has no red eyes, which i'm not sure if even the first open hand release had, so i suspect there is some kind of repackaging going on.

I highly doubt it. Then again, I only doubt it as much as you find it suspicious. I just don't think Mattel is low-down like that. They can't run a website very well, but they aren't going to sell product that has been returned.

"Since you got here by not thinking, it seems reasonable to expect that, in order to get out, you must start thinking." ~ Tock, the Watchdog

Alexx has a blog?! Come on in and check out Toys and Tomfoolery! You won't regret it...until the next morning.

i wonder if "destroyed" means "dissassembled, sent back to factory, reassembled"

Me too. In the other Cyber Monday threads, I posted that both the 3rd issue Skeletors I received, as well as the 2nd issue from back in January, were both re-taped on the bottom of the white mailer. Also, in both cases (which I forgot to point out in my previous posts), Skeletor wasn't pressed completely into his plastic tray. It's as if he'd been taken out, "fixed", then haphazardly placed back into his tray and re-packaged.

Both of the He-Man's I ordered this week also arrived with badly positioned hair pieces, one slightly better than the other one though, so he'll stay MOC.

Also, my Battle Cat isn't marked "The Original", and his helmet isn't fit onto his head properly, just like the first run. In the other thread, I theorized that Matty made both runs at the same time, so this BC is actually from the first run. Now I think that the factory might'a just screwed up and used the wrong insert file or something? I really wished they woulda fixed BC's helmet placement though.

After reading this thread, I asked on another board if I had orginal stock of my 2 BC's. So someone said that YEAH I did cause their BC had the burst on the front so that makes me really happy but my BC's had droopy heads but it was fixed with a piece of cardboard stuck in the empty space. The other 1 that is sealed was dinged up box where the 1 I opened was not. SO I have a good box that is opened and a dinged up box with a piece of metal wire sticking through the box sealed. Oh well I guess you can't win them all.

I feel your pain guys.
I too got a crappy wig He-Man from the Cyber Monday sale. I picked this up planning to keep it mosc, but had to open er up to fix the do. This seems very close to the first release, but with fixed shoulders, and less red eyes.
Ah well, heres hoping BC is in good shape.

Sounds like I did the smart thing by buying He-Man and Skeletor before Cyber monday. But I just thought Skeletor had a green face with a yellow wash over it to make it look all decayed and creepy. Turns out it's bad paint.
Oh well, it still looks cool!

I recently purchased my first MOTU classics figures from the cyber monday sale and was eagerly awaiting my delivery when I stumbled I upon this website (which is awesome by the way) and this thread in particular. It kind of got me worried. I shelled out 80 bucks for He-Man, Skelator, and Battle Cat and I was concerned about the quality of these figures, especially for the price. When I received my figures I was pleasantly surprised. My figures seem to be pretty decent compared to what some of you have posted. My only complaints have to do with the packaging. My BC's package had a couple of tabs sticking out like someone was in a hurry to put it in and get it boxed. The tabs were easily folded back and tucked in so no harm done I guess. As for the others, both of my white mailer boxes for HM and Skelly are not marked with their names. They say MOTU Classics and all that but they don't have their names on the boxes. Anyone else ever come across this before. I realize these are very minor things but if I had planned to keep these MOC or wanted to get them graded it could have potentially been a problem.

I'm reviewing all of the past Q&A session answers we've received, and have come up with something interesting. In WTFWTK 2.4 someone submitted the following question:

5. Many people received King Grayskull figures that appeared to have been opened then retaped shut. What was the reason for this?
No Grayskulls were opened and reshut. This is just how they were produced in the factory. We will mention this to our vendors to avoid packaging looking like this in the future.

7. Why are some people receiving MOTUC Stratos figures with the package taped at the bottom?
We are honestly not sure. This may be an error from the factory and we have passed this feedback along to them.

What do you make of this? Keep in mind this was back when King Grayskull was first released, and not related to his reissue.

A different quote from WTFWTK 2.12 that I felt was relevant to this discussion:

9. It appears that the paint app consistency has varied on the three figures released to-date.
For example, both He-Man and Skeletor seem to have two different paint apps on their faces. A glossy finish version and a more matte finish version. Why is this?
There is only one paint master for all of the figures. Each figure is painted by hand so what you are seeing here are subtle differences and human error.

Yet another quote that could be considered relevant to this discussion. This one is from WTFWTK 2.16:

8. There have been numerous reports on He-Man.org alone of production mistakes on MOTUC figures. Why are all these errors happening?
Mistakes happen in all toy lines. We do have rigorous safety and quality testing but sometimes mistakes are made. They just tend to be more noticeable on a highly collectable line such as MOTUC because these have dedicated fans who discuss the lines in detail online (which is a good thing as it helps us ID the mistakes and correct them - as we did with King Grayskull’s foot problems)

7. Some fans have noticed a decline in the quality of the paint applications. Although we are aware that the figures are hand-painted, is there any way to fix this problem at the factory, and what sort of Quality Control measures are in place?
We constantly strive to put out the best figures possible. If you have samples with any errors it would be great to post them so we can review with our vendors.

Are we being sold returned merchandise?

Hello. To the mods, I didn't want to post this in the Digital River thread because I'd really like people to see it, and that thread doesn't get much traffic. Here are a few pictures of the package from a Buzz Off figure that I recently received from Mattel. Upon arrival, I noticed that the bubble was peeling on the top left corner. Upon closer inspection, I found that the bubble had been affixed over top the remnants of an old bubble that had been cut off. I'm hoping that this was just a factory error, and some lazy worker decided to do a quick fix; however, I can't help but wonder if this was a returned figure that they were trying to pass off as new. What are your thoughts? I've contacted Digital River and they are sending a replacement, but this is still a little disconcerting.

2) Was there anything actually wrong with the figure itself that makes you think it had been returned?

I'm not judging your reasons for requesting a replacement at all, just interested in your mindset/reason for concern.

As an opener, I would have looked at that and said "hmm. How weird. Oh well, as long as Buzzy's ok, I'm ok."

Yes, MOC collector here, so this is completely unacceptable to me. The figure itself is fine, although I did also notice that there is no banding around the waist to hold it firmly in the blister like there is with most.

That's exactly what I thought; it's a matter of principle. Even if it's not a returned item, the fact that they would actually cut a damaged bubble off and stick the new one on right over top of what was left of the old is ridiculous. They didn't even bother trying to hide it by lining it up right. It really makes you wonder, is the cost of new card back worth the money they could lose by ticking off a potential long-term customer? I hate the fact that from now on I'll have to go over my shipments with a fine-toothed comb to make sure they don't try to pull something like this again.

I am an 'opener' and I know that I would have been very annoyed at this.

My rationale? I would be under the impression that I was buying a brand new figure not a 2nd hand one or returned. It's the principle.

Like I said, wasn't judging, just curious.

When I was in line at the Entertainment Earth booth to get Faker vs. Bizarro for myself and a friend, I noticed one of the boxes on the shelf was badly damaged. I was about to tell them that I'd take the damaged one so that there'd be more MOC's for the collectors out there...

...then they told me I could only buy one at a time.

By the time I made it back through the line, the beat up one was already gone.

Aaron
PoP Variants are part of the vintage line, too! Starburst She-Ra, Shower Power Catra, and Scratchin' Sound Catra for 2015!!!

When Demo-Man was announced at SDCC, I ordered a Skeletor to use with the Alcalla head that comes with DM... The Skeletor figure arrived today and I'm pretty sure it has been returned. The box had 2 pieces of tape on the top lid instead of one, I have almost every figure Mattel released and never got a box with more than one piece of tape. The paint job on Skeletor's head is a disgrace and the sword has a few paint blobs... This is with no doubt the worse figure I ever got from Mattel, even worse than Robotto. If this was suppose to be my main Skeletor figure, I would return it!

Update

I opened the figure to check for more defects, while removing the head guess what I found? A rubber band on the head peg!!!! I can't believe this! If someone needed proof that we're getting returned figures, here it is! I don't believe that the factory workers are putting rubber bands on pegs to avoid the head bobbling... This is very very wrong!!!